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The 'Haldane relationship' underlies traditional relations between British ministers and their civil servants. Its doctrine of fusion between them is contrasted with the American one of separation. It is traced from its origins in monarchy through its adaptation to a civil service based on merit and then to the larger departments which survived the first world war. The strengths and weaknesses of the approach are discussed. While it enabled ministers to do much more than they could on their own, it was associated with an ascendancy of civil service over ministerial power which, despite changes in detail in the 1960s and 1970s, remained the greater power until the end of the 1970s. How far it contributed to the difficulties the British government had in solving the political and economic problems of the postwar period is discussed as are the reasons for its decline in the 1980s and 1990s, as well as the consequences for ministerial relationships with officials and thereby on the working of government. (Parliamentary Affairs / FUB)